Constitution Day, September 17

Celebrate Constitution Day tomorrow by buying and reading America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited. Dedicated to the constitutionalists of all parties, the book challenges the assumption that the Constitution was a landmark in the struggle for liberty. Instead, I argue it was the product of a counter-revolution, a setback for the radicalism represented by America’s break with the British empire. Drawing on careful, credible historical scholarship and contemporary political analysis, I suggest that this counter-revolution was the work of conservatives who sought a nation of “power, consequence, and grandeur.” America’s Counter-Revolution makes a persuasive case that the Constitution was a victory not for liberty but for the agendas and interests of a militaristic, aristocratic, privilege-seeking ruling class. 

Get yours today!

Podcast Interview on the Constitution

Aaron Keith Harris and I discussed America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited on the LP Mises Caucus podcast, Decentralized Revolution. Listen here. 

New Interview: Spinoza, the Constitution, and Palestine

Happy Constitution Day!

On this Constitution Day, may I modestly suggest the perfect gift for your loved ones?

A Preview to my Book "America's Counter-Revolution"

Happy Constitution Day

Buy it here.

A Review of America's Counter-Revolution

My thanks to Winton Bates of Australia for his review of America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited.

Did the framers of the U.S. Constitution intend it to protect liberty? 

A week ago my answer would have been along the lines that while I could not claim any expertise in American history I had the impression that the natural right to liberty had been recognised in both the US Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution.... 

My view of the libertarian credentials of the framers of the US Constitution has been challenged over the past week by my reading of Sheldon Richman’s book....

Read it all here.

Happy Constitution Day!

It's a good day to read America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited.

America's Counter-Revolution Reviewed

Independent historian (and old friend) Joseph R. Stromberg reviewed America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited at The American Conservative magazine website. He opens "The Federalists' Revenge" with:

America’s Counter-Revolution, dedicated “To the constitutionalists of all parties,” gives new meaning to the word pithy. In 20 short chapters (most of which were previously columns in the Freeman and elsewhere) Sheldon Richman achieves a remarkable thematic coherence, giving the reader a nice window into American constitutional argument and thus into American history.

Building on Arthur E. Ekirch’s Decline of American Liberalism (1955), Richman concludes that the Federalists gave America a vague constitution having the appearance of limited powers but marred by implied ones: a “living constitution” for conservative nationalists. The Federalists, recall, set imperial greatness above liberty and thought real limits on power “impossible”; so-called Anti-Federalists opposed the rule of self-nominated aristocrats and believed in dispersed power.

A Flaw in the Limited-Government Case

A flaw in the limited-government advocate's brief against statelessness is the overlooked fact that the state is not a homogeneous blob. It is a group of individuals who cooperate to accomplish certain ends (for good or ill). No superstate compels their cooperation. That is, they exist in a state of anarchy with respect to one another. In other words, widespread, decisive cooperation goes on everyday without state supervision or enforcement. QED.

Limited-government advocates thus reify the state as much as other statists do.

Another way of putting my point: the minarchist's goverment is un-praxeological. The state does not seem to consist of individuals who need reasons (incentives) to act in the ways the minarchist assumes. Rather it's as if the state were a single acting entity that conducts itself appropriately. Why? Because it has no other choice under its constitution.

This assumes away all the interesting problems -- e.g., why do armed people (police, soldiers) carry out the orders of unarmed people (dictators, kings, presidents, prime ministers)?

It is unreal.

You can see this argument more fully developed in the last chapter of America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited.

Patriot's Lament

On Saturday, Joshua Bennett interviewed me about America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited on his radio program, "Patriot's Lament." Here's the audio.

The Constitution, Tom Woods, and I

I was the guest on The Tom Woods Show podcast yesterday. Our topic: America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited.

Yet More Praise

The Anti-Federalists were right: The pursuit of "national greatness" inevitably diminishes liberty and centralizes government. The U.S. Constitution did both, as Sheldon Richman demonstrates in this powerfully argued anarchist case against the blueprint for empire known as the U.S. Constitution. 

--Bill Kauffman, author, Forgotten Founder, Drunken Prophet: The Life of Luther Martin

More Praise for America's Counter-Revolution

America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited

The libertarian movement has long suffered from a constitutional fetishism that embraces an ahistorical reverence for the U.S. Constitution. Far too many are unaware of the extent to which the framing and adoption of the Constitution was in fact a setback for the cause of liberty. Sheldon Richman, in a compilation of readable, well researched, and compelling essays, exposes the historical, theoretical, and strategic errors in the widespread reification of a purely political document. With no single correct interpretation, the Constitution has been predictably unable to halt the growth of the modern welfare-warfare American State. I urge all proponents of a free society to give his book their diligent attention.

--Jeffrey Rogers Hummel, Professor, San Jose State University; author, Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men: A History of the American Civil War

Jeff Tucker Interviews Me about "America's Counter-Revolution

You're Invited!

Jeff Tucker and I will talk about my book at 7 pm EDT tonight at Liberty.me. Join us!

Income Tax Day

If you hate the income tax (among others), damn the Rats (Federalists) and praise the Anti-Rats (Anti-Federalists). Ignore those who blame someone else later in American history. Don't let the original bad buys off the hook.

As Lysander Spooner said,

But whether the Constitution really be one thing, or another, this much is certain – that it has either authorized such a government as we have had, or has been powerless to prevent it. In either case, it is unfit to exist.

For details see America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited.

Latest Webinar: America's Counter-Revolution

Here's the video of my latest webinar at Liberty.me:

America's Counter-Revolution Now at Amazon!

America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited is now available at Amazon.com. A Kindle edition is also available. Check it out!

From the back cover:

This book challenges the assumption that the Constitution was a landmark in the struggle for liberty. Instead, Sheldon Richman argues, it was the product of a counter-revolution, a setback for the radicalism represented by America’s break with the British empire. Drawing on careful, credible historical scholarship and contemporary political analysis, Richman suggests that this counter-revolution was the work of conservatives who sought a nation of “power, consequence, and grandeur.” America’s Counter-Revolution makes a persuasive case that the Constitution was a victory not for liberty but for the agendas and interests of a militaristic, aristocratic, privilege-seeking ruling class. 

Praise for America's Counter-Revolution:

The libertarian movement has long suffered from a constitutional fetishism that embraces an ahistorical reverence for the U.S. Constitution. Far too many are unaware of the extent to which the framing and adoption of the Constitution was in fact a setback for the cause of liberty. Sheldon Richman, in a compilation of readable, well researched, and compelling essays, exposes the historical, theoretical, and strategic errors in the widespread reification of a purely political document. With no single correct interpretation, the Constitution has been predictably unable to halt the growth of the modern welfare-warfare American State. I urge all proponents of a free society to give his book their diligent attention.

--Jeffrey Rogers Hummel, Professor, San Jose State University; author, Emancipating Slaves, Enslaving Free Men: A History of the American Civil War 

"No state or government can limit itself through a written constitution, no matter how fine the words or how noble the sentiments they express. It is one of the many virtues of Sheldon Richman's book that it shows how this is true even of the American Constitution, which despite the promises of its designers and the insistence of its defenders down the years, made limited government less and not more likely."

 --Chandran Kukathas, London School of Economics

“This book is a milestone in real liberal history. Never to my knowledge has the liberal critique of constitutionalism been so acutely and concisely put. All those defending the heavy hand of statism will henceforth have to answer Richman’s assessment point by point. He sums up the issues deftly. This book is the best extant overview of the matter.”

—Walter E. Grinder, Institute for Civil Society

“Richman delivers an accessible, incisive, and well-grounded argument that the Constitution centralized power and undid some of the Revolution’s liberating gains. He rebuts patriotic platitudes but avoids the crude contrarianism so common in libertarian revisionism written for popular consumption. He does not romanticize America’s past or overstate his case. Radical and nuanced, deferential to freedom and historical truth, Richman rises above hagiography or demonization of either the Federalists or anti-Federalists to produce an unsurpassed libertarian exploration of the subject.”

— Anthony Gregory, Independent Institute

“[A]fter reading this book, you will never think about the U.S. Constitution and America’s founding the same way again. Sheldon Richman’s revealing and remarkably well-argued narrative will permanently change your outlook. . . . Richman . . . [is] one of this country’s most treasured thinkers and writers . . . . [H]e draws on the most contemporary and important scholarly research, while putting the evidence in prose that is accessible and compelling.”

— Jeffrey A. Tucker, Liberty.me and Foundation for Economic Education

“Several years ago, in just a few short blog posts and exchanges, Sheldon Richman changed my mind—he challenged my naïve view of the Constitution as an imperfect but basically libertarian blueprint for a minimalist state. No, the Interstate Commerce clause was not really just about free trade. No, the taxing authority is not as limited as we would like to argue. In America’s Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited, Richman demonstrates that the purpose of the Constitutional project was to expand and centralize the new federal government’s powers. This is a much-needed antidote to US-centric Constitution worship common among libertarians and conservatives.

— N. Stephan Kinsella, Center for the Study of Innovative Freedom

Help Support America's Counter-Revolution: The Constitution Revisited

You can support my efforts to promote this book through PayPal -- see the link to the right -- or by becoming a patron at Patreon. I hope you'll consider it. Thanks!